Beguiling the Enemy’s Patriarch - Chapter 145

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 145
I heard Auredhian issuing a low command, and Soleia’s voice humming melodiously in response.
“Of course, it’s the Princess everyone desires.”
[…?]
[…?]
Question marks materialized simultaneously above both Raulus and my head. What was that about? I could understand my own confusion, but Raulus had clearly spent far too long as an insignificant presence. Watching him squirm awkwardly under the weight of reverent gazes—despite constantly spouting accusations of irreverence and sacrilege—made it abundantly clear.
[Crumb, tell those glittering eyes to look away.]
Raulus, now five times my size, burrowed clumsily into my embrace—though of course, he couldn’t actually nestle there. Having remained diminished for so long, he’d lost all sense of his true proportions. I tickled his belly while offering Auredhian an ambiguous smile.
[So then… well. You believe me now, don’t you?]
“…No. I already believed you.”
This time, the absurdity of it made me burst into laughter. I tapped Auredhian, who had drawn closer, with a pointed remark.
[That expression won’t fool anyone, you know.]
“I simply didn’t want to believe it. How was I supposed to know the continent’s guardian deity could be like this?”
[Our Lari is rather frivolous, I’m afraid.]
“Even the way you address him….”
Auredhian’s expression screamed disbelief—the look of someone confronting an ancestor who was decidedly not what he’d imagined. I couldn’t blame him; I’d feel the same. I rose to my feet, coaxing the suddenly bashful Raulus along.
[Shall we go now? To retrieve my body…!]
Thus began what I dubbed Operation Body Recovery.
* * *
“Why is this body so pathetically weak!”
Hades cursed, probing his new form with trembling hands. Something was terribly wrong. This body should have been brimming with vitality, saturated with Raulus’s divine essence.
“Cough.”
His insides twisted violently. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
“What manner of body is this….”
During the nearly two years he’d inhabited Soleia’s form, he’d never experienced such heaviness. Moreover, caught in the flames of purification at the final moment, his complete dominion over this body had become constrained.
Zing. The crimson magic circle beneath his feet activated once more. This was the third invocation.
“Ugh.”
He could feel his insides deteriorating. If the Princess contained within perished, it would be catastrophic—she was the most formidable divine essence that could touch beyond Udeta. The magic circle burned increasingly crimson. The silver cross earring dangling from his ear began to tremble violently.
Whoooooosh—.
The boundary between the surface world and the divine realm. Udeta would not reject this body. After all, it was the vessel that had summoned Raulus himself. A body overflowing with the purest, most luminous divine essence.
“I’m returning.”
His expression twisted grotesquely—a visage the body’s original owner would never have worn. Thump, thump, thump. His heart pounded with unease. The silver cross earring hanging from one ear trembled violently, unable to withstand the surging magical power. The deep crimson jewel embedded at its center vibrated as though it might shatter at any moment.
“My homeland.”
The entrance to Udeta, which had existed far beyond the distant sky, suddenly plummeted earthward. Cough. Another spasm of coughing seized him. Something within his body was collapsing.
Which would arrive first? Hades gazed upward alongside Viseau at the darkening sky. The deep blue heavens. Ash-gray clouds spiraling and converging toward a single point. Pale silver luminescence. The song of angels. The land of abundance. The beautiful, distant world of gods where he’d played with his brothers millennia ago.
“Ah….”
A soft moan escaped between his bleeding lips. The lights that had shimmered faintly across the deep blue sky were becoming increasingly distinct. They were stars. Spreading in geometric patterns, they suddenly formed a perfect silver ring.
Joy bloomed across his pallid face.
“…At last.”
The entrance opened.
* * *
Arriving at the Capital Barishard took far less time than I expected. Raulus was swift, but Auredhian was swifter still. It was only natural—he had traversed the distance in a single leap via magic circle.
Soleia had said she would wait outside the Temple. The concentration of sanctity within the Sanctuary of the Temple was simply too high for Soleia to maintain her sanity while enduring it.
Especially not while wearing the holy restraint shackles. It would likely be far worse than merely having her skin burned away. Just before stepping through the Temple entrance, Soleia, who remained behind, urged me with a plea.
“Send a signal, Princess. A grand one that can be recognized instantly from a distance.”
[I will.]
“Let’s see… Yes, that damned flame should suffice.”
That damned flame. I couldn’t even laugh—I could only nod. Well, I was wearing the shackles too, and the Holy Knights were present. Besides, hearing her speak that way, even Soleia wouldn’t suddenly have a change of heart. With that thought, the moment I stepped into the Temple—
[Ah…]
A strange sense of discord washed over me. Auredhian caught even my smallest whimper and immediately turned his head.
“Yerenika.”
[…]
I couldn’t answer his call immediately. The moment my feet touched the Temple floor, the heavy weight that had been dragging my soul down from the earth suddenly lifted. Yet the sensation I had just experienced was somewhat distant from that sense of liberation.
I instinctively looked upward. The sky, where even the sunset had completely faded, was a deep blue-black. A glimmer. Something seemed to sparkle far above in that distant sky.
Stars.
I murmured softly.
[We must hurry.]
On the night Raulus descended to the surface in response to my summoning, I had certainly seen stars through the opening in the ceiling above the Altar. My gaze would not leave the heavens. Raulus seemed to sense something similar. Soft silver fur brushed against the nape of my neck. I slowly straightened my head and smiled reassuringly at Auredhian, whose expression was clouded with worry.
[Why are we standing here? Let’s go.]
“…”
His reddish eyes closed slowly, as if holding back something that threatened to burst forth, then opened again.
“If you feel anything at all, you must tell me immediately, Yerenika. Please.”
[Yes.]
I nodded lightly. It wasn’t a lie. What I felt was only the deep sanctity soaked into the earth of the Barishard Temple, and that distinctive sanctity that enveloped Auredhian’s body. Nothing more. The form of my soul remained clear. Even with Raulus grown to this size, it wavered not at all.
[…]
I gazed for a moment at my still-sensationless hands, then clenched them into fists. It was time to summon the thief who had stolen my body.
* * *
“This is my first time ascending this Altar…”
The Altar of Barishard Temple. This place, where Raulus descended to the surface once every ten years, was the holiest of all Sanctuaries—a place even the Emperor could not tread upon carelessly.
“This is my first time as well, Your Majesty.”
Diego’s unfamiliar murmur echoed from behind.
“…”
Auredhian stood lost in thought before the enormous Altar. He knew the procedures of the summoning ritual. It was one of the imperial heir education courses he had received since early childhood. The summoning of Raulus God, which occurred once every ten years. The procedure itself was not complex. A designated location. A medium to bind the Absolute to the surface. And the summoner’s sanctity.
In other words, a baptismal name.
“…”
Auredhian gazed across the enormous rectangular marble Altar with a troubled expression. Two years ago, Yerenika had summoned Raulus God from this very place.
“Have you prepared the medium, Your Majesty?”
“…There is nothing separate to prepare.”
The cord of a necklace hanging long below his chest swayed gently in the breeze. The small silver cross suspended from the silver cord swayed with it.
A soft chime.
“Ah, that….”
Diego let out a small exclamation of realization.
“Yes. A most fitting intermediary indeed.”
“Quite so.”
Auredhian answered flatly and turned his gaze away from the altar. Yerenika was over there, holding Raulus’s avatar and speaking to it.
[It’s time for you to shrink again, Raulus.]
[How much?]
[Like before. Small enough to fit in my palm.]
[But then what of my dignity…?]
The enormous wolf’s sky-blue eyes took on a pitiful gleam, as though tears might spill forth at any moment. Auredhian could no longer contain himself and let out a hollow laugh.
“Judging by the divine aura and pressure he emanates, it does seem fitting….”
In truth, he was still somewhat confused. Were all gods inherently this frivolous? Raulus was known to be a deity who favored humanity and possessed a generous nature. That much seemed accurate enough.
“….”
Yet as Auredhian watched the enormous wolf vigorously rubbing its massive head against the space between Yerenika’s face and neck, he found himself overwhelmed by profoundly contradictory emotions.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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